LOS ANGELES — Steven Spielberg’s inner child must have pushed him forward in his chair in a Beverly Hills hotel suite. He had just been asked how he became intrigued with Abraham Lincoln and he could barely contain himself.

“I was five years old when my uncle took me to the Lincoln Memorial,” recalled Spielberg during an exclusive Canadian interview with Postmedia News.

More than a few incredible things happened after that monumental childhood discovery in Washington, D.C.

He went from a suburban kid to a boy-wonder TV director, then an Oscar-honoured filmmaker who brought us, among many other things, Jaws, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, Schindler’s List, Saving Private Ryan and most recently The Adventures of Tintin and War Horse.

The circle would not be broken, however.

More than 60 years later, Spielberg has finally satisfied his youthful obsession by presenting the biopic Lincoln, which opens in Toronto on Nov. 9 and in selected Canadian cities Nov. 16.

Daniel Day-Lewis plays Lincoln in the historical drama that spans the last months of the U.S. president’s life before his assassination. In the film, he’s dealing with the raging Civil War while trying push through the Emancipation Proclamation, which would abolish slavery in the U.S.

The behind-the-scenes political infighting is a main ingredient in the movie, but Spielberg is keen to reveal the man behind the iconic myth as well.

To that end, Lincoln is depicted coping with his unstable wife Mary Todd Lincoln (Sally Field), who is still grieving over the early death of their child. The president also tries to stop his adult son Robert (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) from enlisting in the brutal war between the North and South.

Co-starring is Tommy Lee Jones, who plays powerful Congressman Thaddeus Stevens. David Strathairn is Lincoln’s key adviser, Secretary of State William Seward.

John Hawkes, James Spader and Tim Blake Nelson bring a light touch to the proceedings. They play political fixers trying to round up enough votes for the U.S. Congress’ approval of the proclamation before the war ends.

“Everybody carries their weight,” said Spielberg of the ensemble. “I was very blessed that I had a year to cast this movie, which meant I could wait for the actors I wanted.”

It all seems like a perfect fit, but even the powerful Spielberg had to be patient in realizing his dream.

At first, everything was working out. He obtained the film rights to Doris Kearns Goodwin’s 2005 Lincoln book, Team of Rivals, before she completed the first few pages.

“That was before the publisher had read a chapter of the book,” said the director proudly.

But one stall led to another; early on Day-Lewis turned down the role, then Liam Neeson accepted only to withdraw and be replaced by first choice Day-Lewis.

What ended up getting settled along the way was the biopic’s timeline. Spielberg and screenwriter Tony Kushner agreed that the story should deal with the last four months of the president’s tumultuous life.

“But we didn’t want to conform to the standard Lincoln-isms,” said Spielberg. “Once we established that our goals were clear, it gave us time to address his personal life.”

He also knew the drama had to be compressed on specific events and without a flashback of Lincoln’s life.

“We needed to focus on a working president, father and a husband,” Spielberg maintained. “I didn’t want to do (the film) if it was the Greatest Hits of Abraham Lincoln; you know, like a golden oldies tribute.”

Indeed, Lincoln may be just as flawed as the rest of the characters in the movie. He comes across as cold and aloof when dealing with his emotionally dysfunctional wife and adult son. Politically, he seems to have as many opponents in his own Republican Party as he does among the Democrats.

When the vote in Congress gets close on the proclamation, Honest Abe even enlists some clandestine operatives to influence the final outcome.

“Desperate times require desperate measures,” said Spielberg. “What Lincoln and the lobbyists did to get the (proclamation) passed was not illegal. It was murky, but noble and grand.”

More than anything, the director wanted to expose the humanity and the humour of the famous historical figure.

“The myth is created when we think we understand a character and we reduce him to a national cultural stereotype,” noted Spielberg. “And Lincoln has been reduced to statuary over the last 60 years or more because there’s been more written about Lincoln than movies made about him.”

Now, he’s been brought to life on the big screen with assistance from Day-Lewis’s measured, and likely Oscar-nominated, performance.

So, it’s not a surprise that Spielberg admits that he wouldn’t have embarked on his mission without his thespian muse.

“I didn’t say this to anybody at the time, but if (Daniel) had finally and ultimately said ‘no,’ I would never have made the movie. It just wouldn’t have been in my life anymore after all those years.”

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